"Okavango" (Part 1): 15-minute video that shares the experiences of an experienced research expedition team in the Okavango Delta (Botswana), as they attempt their fourth crossing of this vast wetland wilderness in September with very low flood levels. No one though they would make it. This is how they did it!

50/50 (Human/Nature) SABC2 (Producer: Zach Vincent)

We have now crossed the Okavango Delta on dug-out canoes or “mokoros” four times as part of the most in-depth study of the Okavango Delta’s abundant birdlife ever undertaken. This ground-breaking study by the Percy FitzPatrick Institute is establishing the data necessary to use 71 wetland bird species as indicators of significant change in the hydrology, flood regime or functioning of this sensitive wetland ecosystem. Every year we “pole” ourselves over 250 miles across this enigmatic alluvial fan in the middle of the Kalahari Desert with our friends and mentors, the baYei River Bushmen. They have taught us how to navigate and pole our own mokoros safely across this vast 18,000 square kilometre patchwork mosaic of channels, floodplains, lagoons, papyrus, reedbeds and thousands upon thousands of islands. We have learnt how to survive effectively off the delta during these 15-18 day passages through a wilderness beyond comparison. I have travelled all over Africa and seen the great wildebeest migrations of East Africa, but have never seen wildlife densities this high anywhere in Africa. These epic expeditions across Africa’s premier wetland wilderness are dedicated each year to UNESCO World Heritage Listing for the Okavango Delta. This video footage will reveal to you a place on earth that needs to be protected as our closest representation of an ancient, primordial world thousands of years ago…

Bertus Louw, a presenter on a very popular Afrikaans language nature show called 50/50 on South Africa’s public broadcaster, joined us on the middle portion of the 2013 Okavango Expedition. It took us a week to get to where we picked up Bertus near Mombo Camp in the geographic centre of the Okavango Delta. We had struggled for days through dry floodplains, reedbeds and papyrus before we eventually crossed broke through to the flowing channels that go through the Mombo area on the northern peninsula of Chief’s Island. I had done part of my PhD fieldwork in this area, so knew it well enough to find the rendezvous point where we found him. The experiences that Bertus shared with us over the following week were captured in these two 15-minute inserts broadcast on the 23rd and 30th December 2013.

The 2013 Okavango Expedition was our most gruelling ever, but recorded more wildlife and bird sightings than ever before. After four years of exploration we had hit the jackpot! Thousands upon thousands of wetland birds and more wildlife than I have seen anywhere in Africa. More encounters with dangerous wildlife than any expedition I have ever been on. This expedition was raw, wild Africa and the videos capture this enlivening, vibrant and intoxicating energy. Both Part 1 & 2 are not to missed! Watch from about 8 minutes in Part 2 to see a mind-blowing encounter with a 5-metre-long crocodile hellbent on eating John Hilton (Commercial Director: Wild Bird Trust)…

Steve poling past a large pod of hippos near Mombo Camp in the heart of the Okavango Delta. Just look at this place! (Paul Steyn)

Please also go to intotheokavango.org for a unique view into our world on expedition. This collaboration between Jer Thorp and I is an effort to represent rich data from a research expedition into one of the remotest locations on earth LIVE online for the world to see… We had a transponder updating our location live everyday and, at the end of each day, we would upload all bird sightings, comments, photos, and sounds from the day. We even had data from temperature loggers and heart rate monitors uploaded live each day.

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The mission of the Okavango Wilderness Project is to secure the Okavango Delta and its vast untouched catchment in perpetuity. The National Geographic film Okavango is a rallying point for the global community of stakeholders, government officials, researchers, activists, tourism operators, community members, conservationists and guides that support the protection of the Angolan catchment. Readers can help build up to our 8-week expedition over 1,000 miles down the length of the Okavango River in 2015 by sharing this epic, once-in-a-lifetime research and conservation expedition down the full length of the Okavango River through an abandoned wilderness into the Delta. -- Steve Boyes.

Steve Boyes: Reviving the Heart of Wild Africa

Born and raised in South Africa, National Geographic Emerging Explorer Steve Boyes has dedicated his life to restoring and preserving Africa's wilderness areas and the species that call them home. In this National Geographic Live! presentation Boyes talks about his experiences in the Okavango and his dreams for protecting its wilderness for generations to come.

Okavango Delta Traverse (August 2014)

For the first time ever a group of National Geographic explorers will be sharing their every move, their research, what they are seeing, what they are hearing, their very heartbeats, and their thoughts and tweets in real-time via satellite while exploring one of the world’s richest wilderness areas, Botswana’s Okavango Delta. This team of baYei River Bushmen, scientists, data artists, writers, photographers, bloggers, naturalists and conservation engineers will be taking the very pulse of Africa’s last-remaining wetland wilderness. This ground-breaking expedition launches on the 17th August and will most likely finish on the 3rd September… Join us and meet the expedition team at intotheokavango.org.

Okavango Feature Film

Okavango will be a National Geographic feature-length film that shares an intimate look at the human experience in wilderness: The ups and downs, the vulnerability and humility, the care and caution, the love, the fear, the frustration, the surrender and dependence on water.

The team of explorers plan to undertake a two-month crossing of the Okavango River system from the source in Angola all the way 1,000 miles down the river through Namibia’s Caprivi Strip and into an untouched wilderness in the heart of the Okavango Delta in Botswana. They will travel like baYei River Bushmen and be subject to the dangers of encountering the worlds largest-remaining populations of elephants, thousands of hippos, 15–foot crocodiles, and some of the last–remaining super–prides of lions on Earth.

Into the Okavango

Follow the Okavango expedition via data uploaded daily to satellite by the team in the Delta. Data is also available through a public API, allowing anyone to re-mix, analyze, or visualize the collected information.

2013 Expedition

Click the image to read the blog posts from the 2013 Expedition to the Okavango.